The CASPer test—an online situational personality test—is gaining significant momentum in the world of medical school admissions. Its purpose is to increase fairness in application evaluation by rating applicants on key personal and professional characteristics such as empathy, compassion, professionalism, and ethics. However, BIG NEWS…. The test format has now changed and some will say pretty drastically!
The test now consists of 15 sections lasting about 100-120 minutes. Of those 15 scenarios, 10 of them are video-based scenarios & the remaining 5 are word-based scenarios. Up until now, besides the added number of scenarios nothing has changed. Here comes the fun part… of those 15 scenarios, the first 9 require regular typed responses but the remaining 6 scenarios require test takers to record their answers via video (very similar to what applicants have encountered at the MMIs).
The typed prompts have the usual 5-minute for 3 questions format whereas the recorded prompts require students to answer 3 questions, delivered one at a time in only 60 seconds.
Of the 9 regular typed prompts, 3 of them are word-based prompts whereas the remaining 6 are video-based prompts. Of the 6 recorded prompts, 2 of them are word-based and the remaining 4 are video-based. In case you’re having trouble internalizing all this information (we know we did!) we have summarized the changes below:
NEW CASPer
100-120 minutes
15 Scenarios total
9/15 TYPED answers (5 minutes to answer 3 questions)
3/9 word-based scenarios
6/9 video-based scenarios
6/15 RECORDED answers (1 minute to answer 1 question… 3 questions total)
2/6 word-based scenarios
4/6 video-based scenarios
In the typed section, students are given 30 seconds (after the video or short prompt) of reflection time before starting to answer the questions. We highly recommend students use this time to do just that- reflect on what you’ve just read or watched and take notes of any important concepts. For the recorded prompts you will not have those 30 seconds of reflection time. Instead, you’ll only have 10 seconds to read the question and 60 seconds to answer.
Just like the old format of the CASPer test, each scenario will be scored by a different rater which means your test will now be scored by 15 people. For this 2022-2023 application cycle, only schools and programs selected by Altus to participate in “early adopter programs” will see the score of the recorded scenarios. Which schools end up as early adopter programs remain unknown. While not every program will use results from the recorded-response section, Altus will be sharing cumulative results to all programs for review.
Don’t hesitate to reach out to our team for more information & prep for the CASPer test!
Good luck!
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